The Recording Option
by militaryhistory
Summary: Prime Ministers and security men are paranoid folk-it's in their nature. AU.
1. Chapter 1

7 April, 1955

Anthony Eden leaned back in his chair. It had been a very long road to this point, with more than a few missteps and deals that he regretted making, and many sacrifices along the way. However, he was finally the Prime Minister of Great Britain, which made all of that worthwhile in his book.

Well, there was one niggling thing. He was, quite probably, going mad.

The reason he had come to this conclusion was quite simple. A portrait on the wall of this office had spoken to him in the first moment that he had been alone here, informing him that some fellow that he had never heard of who bore a title he had never heard of—"Minister of Magic," whatever that meant—was going to come see him tonight, and, as if to add to the insanity, was coming via the fireplace, of all things. This was, he was quite sure, a hallucination caused by nervous strain brought on by the election.

Nevertheless, he had to be certain, and so here he was in his office, staring at the fireplace, well after he should be home eating dinner. He had about come to the conclusion that he had simply been hallucinating when the fire turned green.

He rubbed his eyes for a second, certain that he was simply seeing things, but, when he had removed his hands from his eyes, the fire was still green. He then jumped in his chair as a man stepped out of the fire.

"Ah, the new Prime Minister, I presume. I'm Aberforth Ponsonby, Minister of Magic. What's your name?" he asked brightly, holding out his hand.

"Anthony Eden," Eden heard himself saying as he took this strange man's hand and shook it.

"Well, now that we've been introduced, let me tell you a few things. One, with any luck, you'll never see me again. I'll only see you again in order to introduce my replacement as Minister, or if some disaster occurs in the wizarding world that bleeds over into your world. Two, you are not going mad. Every Prime Minister of Britain since Robert Walpole, and almost every monarch of England since Ethelred the Unready, has known of us. Three, don't bother trying to contact me, or my successor. There's no way for you to do so."

He turned and stepped back towards the fire, and threw some kind of powder into it that turned it green again. "And fourth," he said, looking back over his shoulder at Eden, who stood looking very much like a fish out of water, "Don't bother telling anyone. After all," he smiled wickedly, "who'd believe you if you did?" And with that, he stepped into the fire and vanished, leaving Eden alone in the Prime Minister's office.

* * *

><p>9 April, 1955<p>

Dick White wondered why the new Prime Minister had requested to see him so soon as he sat outside his office. He had assumed that there would be a bit more of a settling in period before the new man requested information from the head of the Security Service.

However, such was not to be, and fortunately he had a copy of all the information he believed the Prime Minister would need to know in a single file folder that he kept in his desk, buried between a file concerning a certain Harold Wilson fellow and another file containing a full accounting of all agency petrol expenses.

When the men the Prime Minister had been meeting with left, he immediately asked White to come into the room. Before White could even attempt to pass the folder to him, the Prime Minister spoke.

"Yes, Mr. White, I am well aware that I will need to be informed about the state of Britain's internal security regarding the infiltration of spies, particularly from the Russians. However, that is not why I wanted to see you today."

White was somewhat bewildered at this statement, but was also curious about what the Prime Minister wanted to speak with him about, if not the security of Britain from spies.

"I want the Security Service," Eden continued, "to place cameras in this office. Not only that, I want them constantly going at all times—take whatever measures necessary to do so. I want you to make especially sure that you cover the chimney over there."

White blinked. Eden was usually a very sensible man—why did he want a camera covering the chimney?

"Also," Eden finished, "since you came all this way, hand me that file you've got there. I might as well know who I can trust the secrets of the Realm with and who I can't."

White relaxed slightly. At least the Prime Minister had some ability to keep it together. "Yes, Prime Minister," he said, and leaned forward to give him the file. "Please note that it is considered unadvisable to leave the building with this material. I would stay, but I'm in a bit of a rush. Please burn all of the materiel in there when you're done—it shouldn't be hard, it's carbon paper."

White paused for a minute, thinking rapidly. While he wasn't entirely sure if installing cameras in the Prime Minister's office fell strictly under protecting the Realm from subversion, it wasn't an outright violation of the Maxwell-Fyfe Directive, and it could be useful. "And I will get those cameras that you want into this office forthwith."

Eden sighed. "Thank you, Mr. White. You have no idea how much of a load that takes off my mind."

* * *

><p>10 January, 1957<p>

Jim Rope yawned. This was one of the most boring assignments he had ever received in his time on the Security Service. It wasn't like he'd been expecting something out of an Ian Fleming novel, but this was a little bit silly. He had spent the last six months staring at television screens showing the entirety of the Prime Minister's office, and while there had been some rather interesting occurrences, they mostly served to point out the stultifying boredom of the rest of the time. Maybe with a new Prime Minister things would be a tad bit more exciting—he hoped so, anyway.

However, this looked like yet another rather boring night, and Rope settled himself in for another uneventful four hours. He started, however, when he saw the new Prime Minister sit up in his chair, and, as his jaw dropped, realized that this was not a normal night in any shape, form or fashion when a man stepped out of the fireplace and extended his hand to shake the Prime Minister's.

He was in a state of shock—such a state of shock, in fact, that he missed the entire conversation the two men had, and almost didn't catch it when the man waved the Prime Minister a cheery goodbye, threw something into the fireplace, then stepped into it and vanished from sight.

He sat there, frozen, for a few minutes. Surely that couldn't have actually happened? Surely a man couldn't have just popped out of a chimney, talked to the Prime Minister, then popped right back into the chimney?

He shook himself, then immediately began to dial headquarters. The Director-General definitely would want to hear about this.

* * *

><p>12 January, 1957<p>

Part of Roger Hollis was still in a state of shock. Surely he and the Prime Minister were not about to discuss how to spy upon wizards who appeared to be running around Britain?

But they were, and while he had been somewhat skeptical of Rope's wild tale, he had been convinced after seeing the tape of what had happened in the Prime Minister's office two nights before.

The other part, however, was still the director of the Security Service, and he came to his feet as soon as the secretary told him he could go into the Prime Minister's office.

The Prime Minister looked somewhat harried, Hollis noted. There were several reasons for this that almost anyone could have guessed, the rift between Britain and the United States that had been occasioned by the Suez crisis being the main one. However, Hollis also knew that what he was about to discuss with the Prime Minister was also involved.

"Ah, Mr. Hollis," Macmillan said as he rose and extended his hand. "What is it that you wanted to discuss with me?"

"Well, Prime Minister," Hollis said slowly, "it has to do with the man who came to see you two nights ago."

Macmillan looked rather like a man might upon being told that his wife had found out that he had been found drunk in Soho the week before. "How did you find out about that?"

"Your predecessor, I presume after receiving a similar visit to yours, asked my predecessor to set up hidden cameras in this office. When I took over the Security Service, I continued the practice. This was one of the things I was going to mention to you during my initial briefing," Hollis replied levelly. "However, now that I know why Prime Minister Eden wanted the cameras set up in his office, I have one question for you. Do you want the Security Service to attempt to find these people?"

Macmillan did not answer for a few moments, and Hollis could see the wheels turning in his head. On the one hand, there was the fact that this Ponsonby fellow had told him not to attempt to contact them. On the other hand, there was the fact that these people represented a Possible Threat to the Security of the Realm.

MacMillan nodded to himself. "Mr. Hollis," he said quietly, "I want you to find these people, but understand that I do not want you to take any of your men off the job of finding Russians, is that clear?"

Hollis, feeling somewhat insulted that anyone would question his commitment to ferreting out Soviet spies, nodded. "Would you like to hear the rest of the briefing?"

"Yes, by all means."

* * *

><p>19 December, 1959<p>

Jim Rope groused to himself as he stood looking at a space in between a book shop and a record shop as the wind that was funnelled down Charing Cross Road bit at him. Did no one come out this way?

He had been assigned to Operation Merlin on the basis that, by virtue of being the man behind the cameras that night in the Prime Minister's office, he was the one who know the most about how these people operated. Rope had pointed out to the assignment officer that while this was technically true, it was a little bit like assigning a man from the Yorkshire Dales to be a guide to cities because he had been to Scarborough once. He had been rather frostily informed that "Seeing Scarborough once is better than not having seen a city at all" and had been assigned to the operation before he could make up another excuse.

As it turned out, he was the only person assigned to the operation, for two reasons. First, the Security Service had been ordered by the Prime Minister not to take men away from its other departments, and second, he had the suspicion that Hollis thought he could take care of himself due to his time with the Royal Marines in Korea.

As a result, he had spent the next year and a half trying to find these elusive wizards on his own. There had been many tantalizing leads—people who had total blanks in their memory regarding certain days, old murders that were utterly inexplicable, and, at one point, he had received notice from an old friend on the Bristol police force of a tea set that moved about on its own. By the time he got there, however, the tea set was gone, his old friend the constable couldn't remember having placed the phone call, and while the old woman who'd called the constable remembered calling him, she was sure that she had called him due to some boys throwing a rock through her window, and couldn't remember anything peculiar about the tea set she had just sold.

This had not deterred him, but had only redoubled his resolve to find these people. Who knew what things these wizards had done to people who now couldn't remember a thing? It wasn't the sort of thing that was supposed to happen in Britain.

It had been pure luck that he'd been walking down this road three months ago when he saw someone walk into the apparently nonexistent space between the book shop and record shop that he was now gazing at so intently. Being a careful man, he had not only written down the location he was going to watch, but why he was going to watch it. He had also elected to not simply stand outside—after all, if they'd escaped detection for this long, they were bound to notice a man staring at the wall between two shops. Therefore, he simply walked by here every few hours, first in one direction, then in another.

This was the hundredth time—he'd counted—that he'd come by here, and there were times when he wondered if he hadn't been seeing things that day. However, he had seen people going into the nonexistent space between the shops, so at least he knew he wasn't barking up the wrong tree. There was the possibility that he was barking mad, but after that film, he wasn't sure what the line was between madness and sanity.

That still left him outside in London in the week before Christmas with the wind going through him like he wasn't there.

When a man did step out of the nonexistent space, Rope almost missed him. He saw the man turn his head, this way and that, and then turn to walk off down the street. Rope quickly followed the man's thatch of red hair down the street, trying to act as much like he wasn't following the man as possible while keeping him in sight at all times.

Rope got lucky. He caught up with his quarry just as he turned into an alleyway, at which point he pulled out the cosh that he kept on his person at all times these days and applied it as lightly as possible to the man's head. He fell like a stone.

At this point, Rope remembered that he had no arrest authority whatsoever and briefly cursed his forgetfulness. He took a brief moment to call down a curse or two on David Maxwell-Fyfe, popped his head out of the alley, and Lady Luck, as if to apologize for what she'd been doing to him these long months, smiled on him again.

"Robert Graves, where've you been?"

"Jim! I never expected to find you in an alley on Charing Cross Road. What brings you here?"

"Business, Robert. Like what we did back in Korea. Can't say anything more."

"You wouldn't be telling me that unless you needed me. You always were closed-mouthed. What d'you need?"

"I need you to arrest someone."

"Arrest someone?"

"This fellow behind me."

Graves looked around Rope, then looked back at him. "Did you hit him with Old Reliable?"

Rope nodded. Graves sighed. "I really hope you got the right man, Jim."

He walked over to the man, knelt, handcuffed him and pulled him to his feet, speaking to him as he did so. "Sir, you are under arrest for…for…" He glared at Rope, who quickly said, "suspicion of being a spy for a foreign power."

"Yes. That," Graves finished. He looked over at Rope. "Where do you want me to take him?"

"Nowhere yet," Rope replied as he walked over to them. "Not until I check him for something."

The man was dazed enough that he made no protest as Rope frisked him, but he had recovered enough that Rope felt him tense as he put his hand on what felt like a wooden stick on the inside of his coat.

"And what might this be, sir?" Rope asked quietly as he pulled the stick out from his coat and noted its symmetry and polished appearance. He saw the man's eyes widen, and Rope decided to hazard a guess. "A wand, perhaps?"

The man immediately tried to jump at him, but Graves held him back. Rope did not smile as he inserted the wand into his own coat. "Sir, I do not want to harm you, and I do not intend to. I simply want to ask you a few questions, and then let you be about…whatever business you were attending to."

The man glared at him, then nodded slowly.

Rope nodded to Graves, who nudged their prisoner into moving along, and they began to walk out of the alleyway. Just before they reached the exit, Rope turned to look back at the red-haired man.

"What is your name, sir?"

The man glared at him briefly, then shrugged. "There's no harm in telling you, I suppose. My name is Septimus. Septimus Weasley."


	2. Chapter 2

19 January, 1957

Rope sat at a table in the flat he had rented for this purpose with a recording device, a microphone, Septimus Weasley's wand, and Septimus Weasley, who looked very frustrated at the fact that his hands were not only cuffed to each other, but also to the back of the frame chair he were sitting in, in front of him. Graves, in the meantime, looked distinctly uncomfortable as he leaned against one of the rather dirty walls, which, like the others, had two or three obviously placed bugs on it. Rope really hadn't wanted to bring him in on this, but he needed another person to help him, Graves had been almost at the end of his patrol, and he trusted him with his life.

He turned on the recording device. "Please state your name for the record," he said in the most formal manner he could manage.

"Septimus Weasley," Weasley replied.

"What is your occupation?"

Weasley glared at him, then shrugged. "The statute has been breached already, and given that you've got recording devices all through here, I don't think that we can Obliviate our way out of this one." He sighed heavily. "I've tried to tell the Ministry that we couldn't keep the statute forever. You Muggles have been advancing your technology so fast that it's hard to keep up, unlike us."

"What statute are you talking about, Mr Weasley?" Rope asked.

Weasley sputtered. "What—you mean you don't—no, of course you don't know what the International Statute of Wizarding Secrecy is, you're not one of us." He sighed. "After your Glorious Revolution, we sought protection from William and Mary, knowing that if we could not get protection in England, we could get it nowhere. They declined because of fear of severe political consequences, particularly from the religious authorities."

"Religious—oh," Rope stopped before he said something stupid.

Weasley nodded. "Exactly. Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live. As a result of this, a group of wizards came together and drew up the Statute in order to protect themselves by concealing themselves, and we have done so ever since. Unfortunately, there have been those of us who have broken this statute, either accidentally or purposefully, and we have a devil of a time dealing with that. Why, I remember this tea set in Bristol half a year back…"

"I remember that!" Rope exclaimed. "It was one of the reasons why I kept hunting for your kind."

"I knew I'd forgotten to ask that constable something," Weasley growled. "Can't believe I forgot to ask if he'd called anyone."

"What would you have done if he had?"

"I would have come to London and Obliviated you," Weasley replied matter-of-factly.

Rope shook his head. "I was recording my conversation with the constable. It wouldn't have worked."

Weasley smiled. "You'd be surprised, Mr—er…"

"The name is Rope, Mr Weasley. Jim Rope."

Graves, still leaning against the wall, snickered. Rope glared at him. Weasley, not noticing the byplay, continued. "We have our methods for dealing with electronic devices, mostly involving just throwing any particular bit of magic at them. But I digress. Only fifty years ago, most of you Muggles didn't have those telephone things. You either used a telegraph or mailed a letter, while we used the Floo Network and messenger owls."

"Excuse me," Rope interrupted, "but what is the Floo Network?"

Weasley gave Rope a very annoyed look, then explained. "It's a transportation network that uses fireplaces to get from one area to another, or can be used to talk to someone. The fireplace in your Prime Minister's office is connected to it, and before you get any ideas," Weasley said as Rope felt his face light up, "it takes magic to get through."

Having said this, Weasley grinned and said, "But again, I digress. Now almost all of you Muggles have telephones in your houses, and many of your government operatives have mobile communication devices, while we are still using fireplaces and birds."

Rope was getting the distinct feeling that this man as holding an ace or two that he wasn't showing, but decided to let it pass. He decided to try and steer this conversation back to its beginning.

"That is quite fascinating, Mr Weasley, but what does that have to do with the International Statute of Wizarding Secrecy?"

Weasley sighed. "What I'm getting at here is that, back in the early days of the Statute, if one of us were caught doing some sort of magic, it was a simple matter for the Ministry to Obliviate the memory of that particular event and all related matters from the minds of the people who witnessed the event, and generally we didn't have to go any further than that. Nowadays we have to find everyone they might have called to tell about this strange thing they saw and Obliviate their memory of being told as well. It's frustrating and worrisome."

"I can imagine that having no memory of an entire day might be somewhat disconcerting," Rope said dryly.

Weasley paused for a minute, then, very slowly, said, "I hadn't thought of that."

"I'll wager you didn't," Graves muttered, "going 'round and wiping folks' memories clean. It's a disgrace, is what it is."

"What would you have us do then, eh?" Weasley said as he glared at Graves. "Reveal ourselves to the world? We tried that already, thank you, and while we didn't lose a lot of people, it sure wasn't for you Muggles' lack of trying."

Rope held up his hands. "Easy, easy, you two," he said in as calm a voice as he could muster, although he shared Graves' displeasure at Weasley's attitude towards removing people's memories. That he wasn't reacting the way Graves had was, he thought, one of the consequences of having been in the Security Service. That, and Graves' temper had not been easy to restrain at the best of times back in Korea, and the period after one had had his view of the world dramatically expanded was probably not the best of times.

"Mr Weasley," Rope said in an effort to get things back on track, "What is your occupation, exactly?"

"I work for the Department of Magical Accidents and Catastrophes, Mr. Rope, where I mostly deal with the aftermath of incidents like that tea set and wizards deciding that it's a jolly good bit of fun to play magical pranks on you people. It's rather distressing what some of our folk think is funny, it is."

"Mr Weasley," Graves said from over against the wall, "How many of our people have been killed by your kind in the past year?"

"The truth, Mr Graves, is that I don't know. I wouldn't estimate more than three, but the fact is that there are so many ways to kill using magic that don't involve directly putting a curse on the target that I couldn't list them all—oh."

"Do you understand why we're somewhat concerned, Mr Weasley?" Rope asked quietly.

"Yes," Weasley said slowly, "Yes, I do."

"Good," Rope said. "Now, I have another question. Are you people only in Britain, or are you in more places?"

"Oh, we're all over the world, although our largest concentrations are in Western and Central Europe."

"Any Russian wizards?" Rope asked, hoping that Weasley would say that they would be willing to engage in subsersive activities against the Kremlin-or, failing that, would remain neutral. He did not want to deal with Russian spies who erase all memory of having been in a particular place at a particular time.

"I have some awareness of why you're asking that, so let me simply say that, with the exception of a man named Gellert Grindelwald, we do not interfere with Muggle politics. And we dealt with him."

"How reassuring," Graves muttered.

Ignoring Graves, Rope continued. "How many wizards are there in the Britain?"

"Around several thousand, I believe. It's one of the largest wizarding communities in the world."

"Wait, wait, wait," Graves said. "You mean to tell me that there are thousands and thousands of people who can do things like erase memories and kill people without leaving a trace of it running about?"

"Ah, no, Mr—"

"Graves."

"Well, Mr Graves, not many wizards are any good at Obliviation, and, in the case of using non-lethal spells on devices to make them deadly, very few would think to do that. Almost none of us really take much interest in Muggle technology, which is one reason why no one in the Ministry's paid any attention to my warnings."

"I see," Rope replied. Maybe there was an angle there. "Would you like to be listened to?"

Weasley sat up and glared at Rope. "I may think that the Ministry is hidebound and foolish, but I will not betray them."

"Easy, easy, Mr Weasley," Rope said quickly, "I would not ask you to betray your people. It is simply that His Majesty's Government does not appreciate being left almost completely in the dark regarding matters that could potentially harm the Realm."

Weasley thought on this a minute. "What are you proposing?"

Rope did not sigh in relief, but it was a near-run thing. "Perhaps we could have lunch, say, once a month and discuss various matters."

"You know," Weasley said, "I'm not entirely sure why I should agree to this in good faith, seeing as our introduction was you hitting me with a blackjack, carting me here, handcuffing me to this chair, and then interrogating me."

"Mr Weasley," Rope replied, "Please consider the previous conversation we have had. Do you not think that I acted prudently? I am on an assignment from my government, sir. This is not a private matter."

Weasley subsided at this and returned to the previous topic of discussion. "What would we discuss during these meetings?" he asked suspiciously.

"Trends in the Wizarding world, and my world, especially those that could cause friction between us or expose you, that sort of thing."

Weasley leaned back and rubbed his chin as he went through what Rope had said. "Yes…that is a thought. In fact," he said, "I like it. But," he continued as he leaned forward, "There are a few conditions, or the deal's off."

"Let's hear them."

"First, you will never ask me for particular locations. Our security depends upon secrecy, Mr Rope."

"Agreed," Rope replied, although he was already trying to think of ways to deal with this problem.

"Second, I make the contact, not you."

"Agreed," Rope replied again, although this was an easy concession to make—he was not going to go patrolling down Charing Cross Road for three months again, and he had no idea how to find this man otherwise.

"Third, this never goes past the absolute minimum number of people in your organization that need to know about it and Mr Graves here."

Rope thought about this for a moment. This seemed like a ploy to ensure that Obliviating would take much less effort than otherwise, but it was probably in the best interests of the Realm. The hysteria that would result from letting this be made public would be horrific—it would be far worse than when the news about Maclean and Burgess got out.

"Agreed," he said, finally.

"Thank you," Weasley replied. "Now could you let me out of these handcuffs and give me my wand back?"

Rope shook his head. "Not until you are well away from here, Mr Weasley."

Weasley shrugged. "Have it your way, then."

Rope got up, walked over to Graves, and whispered, "Get him to Hyde Park, give him his wand back, and let him go."

"Right. And where will you be?" Graves whispered back.

"Getting this to the Security Service. I don't want to lose this information."

Graves nodded, and they both walked over to the table, where he began the tedious business of un-cuffing and re-cuffing Weasley, while Rope slipped the tape recorder into his coat's inside pocket and held Weasley's wand. Once he had been removed from the chair, Rope gave the wand to Graves, who placed it inside his coat, and they all headed to the door. Once they had left the building, Rope looked at Graves as he turned to go down to Hyde Park. "Write everything that's happened today down, Rob."

Graves nodded. "I will, and make sure you've got several copies of that recording."

"Believe you me," Rope said as they parted, "I will make sure we don't lose this information."

* * *

><p>20 January, 1957<p>

"What did you think you were doing, Rope?" Hollis yelled. "You get your first lead in months, and what do you do? You throw him back after barely an hour! Where's the sense in that, man?"

Rope did not answer. He had anticipated that Hollis would call him into his office and give him a thorough tongue-lashing for letting Weasley go, which was why he had crafting his response since he woke up this morning.

"Well, aren't you going to answer?"

"Sir, did you listen to the recording of the interrogation?"

"Yes, I did."

"Do you recall the part where he very casually mentioned that there was a large group of wizards whose job it was to erase the memories of regular people who find out about magic?"

"Yes. And?"

"If we had kept him, it is very likely that he would have been missed, and that they would have sent people after him, it is very possible that they would have been able to find us instantly, and then there would have been almost no chance of us being able to use this information. As it is, I was able to get several copies of the transcript made and sent off to every station in Britain we have."

Hollis leaned back in his chair. "Hmmmm…yes, I suppose so. Can you trust him to keep his word?"

"I think so, sir."

"That's not precisely what I wanted to hear, Mr Rope, but given the circumstances, well done."

"Thank you sir."

"By the way, when are you supposed to meet this Weasley fellow?"

"I'm not sure, sir—however, I know he doesn't want this information getting out, so I imagine he'll contact me quite soon."

"Do you think he'll tell anyone?"

"Possibly. I can't see him being very enthusiastic about telling his superiors, though. Probably just his wife, if he's got one."

* * *

><p>19 January, 1957<p>

"Albus, we have a problem," Septimus Weasley said as he came into Albus Dumbledore's office.

"What sort of problem might that be, and would you like a lemon drop?" Dumbledore asked as he ate one of the candies.

"They know, Albus!"

"Who knows what, Septimus? Does Barty Crouch know about Mundungus Fletcher's affinity for illegal flying carpets?"

"I'm being serious, man. It's the Muggles! They know we exist."

"Come, come, come," Dumbledore replied, "There have been many Muggles who have discovered our existence—as I recall, your work is dealing with Muggles who discover our existence. Why are you all in a lather?"

"Because it's not just some random bathers who happened to see a dragon or some old lady with a tea set, it's MI5!"

That changed matters. "How did they find out?" Dumbledore asked quietly.

"I know they caught me when I came out of the Leaky Cauldron—I don't know how they knew to look there, though."

"Yes—this is bad, Septimus, very bad indeed. There is hope, though—does the man who captured you intend to keep it secret?"

"Yes, he does, or so he told me."

"I imagined he might. I had some dealings with some of their Security men while I was hunting Grindelwald—all concealed of course—and they were near to hysterics based only on what I told them, which was that he was a member of the Black Sun organization."

"What is the Black Sun organization?"

"What was it, say rather. A group of Nazis who had various interests in magic—they went about it all the wrong way of course. But anyway, there would likely be severe consequences if the British government were to reveal our existence to the world. They will likely keep it under lock and key. What did they want from you, anyway?"

"I think they want to find about things before they start falling apart, instead of when they do. They wanted me to act as another source besides the Minister," Weasley replied.

"Yes, that is understandable. I do want to know, Septimus, why you have come to me with this information. I am not, after all, in the Ministry."

"I was worried, Albus."

"About what?"

"You know what the Ministry's favoured method is! Obliviate them all and maybe perform some memory modifications."

"It appears to have worked thus far," Dumbledore pointed out gently

"The problem is," Weasley retorted, "I'm willing to bet that now that MI5 have got on it, they've performed several precautionary measures to avoid us simply memory modifying them and making them think it was all a hoax. I thought you might have a better idea of what to do."

Dumbledore pondered this question for a moment, then recalled what he'd seen of the British secret services. Very serious and dedicated men, they'd been, not ones to discount anything that might be a threat to the Realm, and ones who would likely deal with opponents with unknown but terrifying capabilities with extreme caution. Yes, Septimus had the right of it. And this could be useful.

"I believe you did well, Septimus," he said at last, "And I believe you were right not to go to the Ministry. Doubtless it would have resulted in a drastic overreaction that might have ended up resulting in the very thing we want to avoid." He thought for a moment. "How did they want to get in touch with you?"

"Their man asked me to contact him once a month to arrange lunch."

"Do so soon, if you would, Septimus. I am very interested to find out what these gentlemen want."


End file.
